Posts Tagged ‘batman begins’

If I could design subliminal messages, I would pipe those two things in to Chris Nolan’s dreams, I swar to gar.

She’s not getting any younger, Mr. Nolan. But you know what she is getting? Ever-more-perfect to play the part of Talia and take these films to the Next Level. Already had her dad as a villain, and his invisible hand is present in the sequel (the drugs Dr. Crane is still moving around GC in The Dark Knight are obviously chemically based on the hallucinogen he weaponized for Ra’s when he was a little more, ahem, put together; as he could have no present access to original stockpiles of that drug’s ingredients due to the plant’s destruction during the riots in the Narrows which concluded Batman Begins, Crane is likely acquiring the material to continue the synthesized manufacture of the fear drug from the League of Shadows, who’d provided him with his chemicals in the past. Yes?). Tie it all in and bring us home by bringing Talia in and let’s do this!

“It’s not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me.” B. Wayne, Batman Begins (Christopher Nolan, 2005).

Agree? Disagree?

Deeds speak volumes for the definition of ourselves, but I think “who we are underneath” is equally important to defining us. In a perfect world, sure, “what you do” is the outer reflection of an ideally ordered inner self. But who the unholy effing heck is that organized and in accord?

The roads not taken, the thoughts kept to ourselves that make up this rich and sometimes treacherous interior landscape of our minds — these are as much an important part of knowing the true core and definition of ourselves as the demonstrative, observable acts any joker on the outside sees, acts that could follow either in accordance with or defiance of that secret inner roadmap. What we are underneath almost arguably eclipses deeds, which can be true or can just as easily be lies that we tell the outside world to keep our inside self a secret. Underneath is where the real and unhideable truth sits.

We are all just knocking around leaving impressions and confiding secrets but sometimes lying and sometimes acting what we would term “out of character,” so really the two things — “what we do” and “what we are underneath” — must be taken together to even approach defining someone.

Not clear why that is set up to be mutually exclusive in this quote. I’m suddenly not sure this is as mind-blowingly brilliant a quote as I thought at first blush lo five years ago.

Photographed for Esquire magazine April 2004 by [searching for credit]

“I think mystery is kind of great. I don’t know anything about Bette Davis or Katharine Hepburn or Ava Gardner — not really — and I like that. I love watching their movies because they’re my personal movie stars. I don’t know what they eat and who their trainer is.”

No clue where this came from; sometimes I just right-click and save things and make no effort to credit them. Super-sorry!

“Most of the time we do nothing, myself included, … I think the lesson I learned from [playing humanitarian Tessa in The Constant Gardner] is that a lot of drops make up an ocean. If people would stand up and say what they believe in maybe we can make a difference. Helping one person is better than nothing. Just do something.”

Still from The Shape of Things

“There’s not much room for eccentricity in Hollywood, and eccentricity is what’s sexy in people.”

I have heard rumors she is one of the actresses who has been approached to play Catwoman in the next Batman movie, but I’ve also heard Chris Nolan quoted saying that Catwoman isn’t going to be in it. It doesn’t matter, because that would be lame anyways. She should not be Catwoman, regardless of whether Selina Kyle pops up in the next movie (a direction which would actually disappoint me).

What Rachel Weisz should do in the new Batman movies is play Talia, the daughter of Rā’s al Ghūl and love of Bruce Wayne’s life. Helloooo, she would be perfect! Talia seriously needs to once and for all get in the mainstream big screen storylines, especially considering how great the new movies Chris Nolan’s been making are: in the comics she even has Batman’s kid, for god’s sake (Damian Wayne, who is the current Robin). It’s already been set up, when, in the novelized Batman Begins, Rā’s al Ghūl refers to having a wife and daughter while he is talking to Bruce.

So, come on. Let’s finally get her in a movie, and let’s have Rachel Weisz play her. The woman is a stranger to neither action pictures (The Mummy franchise) nor comic book movies (the wildly underrated Constantine). That’s my awesome suggestion: obey!